Diego Cortez

American art curator, publicist and filmmaker closely associated with New York's late 1970s "No Wave" scene (30 September 1946, Geneva, Illinois — 21 June 2021, Burlington, North Carolina). Diego Cortez (né James Allan Curtis) co-founded the legendary Mudd Club and was one of the earliest members of renowned New York's Colab. He directed music videos for Talking Heads and Blondie, among other notable artists. Cortez also curated an iconic New York/New Wave group exhibition at MoMA PS1 in 1981, which broke Jean-Michel Basquiat to mainstream fame. Diego spent his final years in a hospice in Saxapahaw, North Carolina, and died, aged 74, from kidney failure. James A. Curtis grew up in Wheaton, Illinois and earned his Bachelor's degree from Illinois State University. Curtis then studied Performance Art and Film/Video Production at The School Of The Art Institute Of Chicago, attending classes of Stan Brakhage (1933—2003) and Nam June Paik (1932—2006), among others, and graduating with his Master's degree in 1973. The same year, Curtis moved to New York City, adopting his life-long artistic alias, Diego Cortez (in honor of his childhood's Hispanic neighborhood). In New York, Diego Cortez worked as a studio assistant of prominent conceptual artist Dennis Oppenheim (1938—2011) and later designer and performer Vito Acconci (1940—2017). Working as MoMA's security guard and picking other odd jobs, Cortez became gradually involved with NYC's underground art scene. In 1978, he co-founded the iconic Mudd Club, New York, in Lower Manhattan's Tribeca neighborhood with Anya Phillips and Steve Maas. The same year, Diego Cortez served as Brian Eno's production advisor on the '78 No New York compilation LP; he co-edited Private Elvis, a book with rare army photographs of Elvis Presley unearthed by Cortez in West Germany. Diego performed with legendary Austrian avantgardist Hermann Nitsch (1938—2022) and many local artists, including Kathy Acker and Laurie Anderson. He also organized Patti Smith's exhibitions. In 1981, Cortez curated a large-scale group exhibition, New York/New Wave, at P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center in Long Island City, Queens. Featuring over 100 distinguished and aspiring new artists, such as Andy Warhol, David Byrne, William S. Burroughs, Robert Mapplethorpe, Nan Goldin, Keith Haring, Fab 5 Freddy, Futura 2000, and Ann Magnuson, the show most notably brought Basquiat to the attention of high-profile art dealers, including Bruno Bischofberger and Annina Nosei, subsequently catapulting him to a well-deserved global success. In 1982, Jean-Michel introduced Diego Cortez to his then-girlfriend Madonna, who invited Cortez to become her manager; he declined this lucrative deal to focus on curating art shows. In 2013, Cortez released his conceptual LP album, Traumdeutung — an eclectic mix of music genres (with numerous featured guests) mixed over the sounds of Diego's snoring.